Peacekeeping Under Fire by Robert A. Rubinstein

Author:Robert A. Rubinstein [Rubinstein, Robert A.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Social Science, Sociology, General
ISBN: 9781317254522
Google: tRXvCgAAQBAJ
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2015-11-17T06:00:07+00:00

Agency and Social Action

In his commentaries on the Roman civil war, Julius Caesar observed that “in war great events are the result of trivial causes.”33 Despite advances in military technology, this observation still rings true today. This is demonstrated by the recent acknowledgment of the role of the “strategic corporal,” especially in operations other than war, which is the military category into which peacekeeping fits.”34 Because the essence of peacekeeping is human engagement, the effect of individual action on the larger institutional and structural context is substantial.

Modeling of the link between collective behavior and individual action is one of the most troublesome areas of social theory. As I discussed in chapter 3, conceptualizations of culture as a directive and homogenizing force were abandoned by anthropologists soon after the mid-twentieth century, largely because they did not account for the intracultural variation that ethnographers found during their fieldwork. The fact that knowing a person’s culture does not allow one to predict precisely that person’s actions thus becomes an important problem in anthropology, as it is in other social sciences. Attempts to link individual actions to collective behavior have led to some very interesting and productive theoretical developments, like those in cognitive linguistics, symbolic anthropology, and practice theory, which I use in this book. Although these theoretical efforts are very fruitful, they do not fully meet the challenge of linking individual action to collective behavior.

The partial disconnect between the individual and his or her group is one reason that cultural accounts of phenomena, like peacekeeping, meet with some skepticism. Cultural accounts are often characterized, incorrectly in my view, as soft, unscientific, or anecdotal.35 Yet the underlying logic of cultural accounts is no different than the logic supporting accounts that derive from theories that use quantitative, statistical techniques to demonstrate their efficacy.36 Concepts such as “consumer confidence” rely on statistically normative behaviors and also do not allow the prediction of individual actions. Even though such measures do not allow the prediction of individual economic actions with any greater facility than do cultural accounts, they form the basis for important public policy decisions.

As instruments of international diplomacy, peace operations take place on a grand stage. But the success of any mission depends upon the actions of individuals and small groups. Often these actions are judgments made on the fly and over seemingly mundane matters. How these matters are handled may go unnoticed, or it may cause an international incident.

How an individual responds to such a challenge depends upon many things. Among these is, of course, his or her training. A second thing that conditions his or her response is the social environment in which he or she acts. And a third element that shapes a peacekeeper’s response is the personal motivation that he or she brings to the situation.

All individuals respond to their environments based on the cultural dispositions that define for them the range of permissible and appropriate actions. Which of the repertoire of permissible actions they enact depends in part on the motivation that energizes that action.

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